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2.You are literally catching attacking hand with your one hand when attacker is doing shomen uchi -- it is very …how should I say in polite way….simplistic If you watch 1935 video of O sensei, he is always cutting attacker's attack.
3. I don't believe that O sensei did ANY technique without atemi -- in your video it is not really visible…

Once you apply these three points, the techniques will start to have some martial dimensions.

It's funny, because I don't really remember him cutting the attacker down from the 1935 film. So I watched it again just now, and I can't say I better understand what you are talking about.

He catches most of the strikes and doesn't seem to cut them down. Maybe I don't understand what you mean by "cutting the attackers attack".

Also, on the third point, I was actually surprised after watching the film again at how few atemi he is using. In the book, I know that I missed several of the atemi after watching my video and looking at the book.It's funny in the video he doesn't do all that much atemi.

It's funny, because I don't really remember him cutting the attacker down from the 1935 film. So I watched it again just now, and I can't say I better understand what you are talking about.

He catches most of the strikes and doesn't seem to cut them down. Maybe I don't understand what you mean by "cutting the attackers attack".

Also, on the third point, I was actually surprised after watching the film again at how few atemi he is using. In the book, I know that I missed several of the atemi after watching my video and looking at the book.It's funny in the video he doesn't do all that much atemi.

For cutting, you will not catch live sword? Rather you cut it ? Strike with hand is only representation of weaopn use....This is how I understand it. Atemi is not only with fist or leg.. the way how you enter creats atemi...

It's funny, because I don't really remember him cutting the attacker down from the 1935 film. So I watched it again just now, and I can't say I better understand what you are talking about.

He catches most of the strikes and doesn't seem to cut them down. Maybe I don't understand what you mean by "cutting the attackers attack".

Also, on the third point, I was actually surprised after watching the film again at how few atemi he is using. In the book, I know that I missed several of the atemi after watching my video and looking at the book.It's funny in the video he doesn't do all that much atemi.

I just watched the whole 14+ minutes of the 1935 video (again). Regarding the cutting the attacker down comment by Szczepan, perhaps he's referring to Ueshiba's cutting motion against shomen and yokomen attacks. Otherwise, I don't see much of anything that could be called cutting the attack, especially against the grabs. Maybe Szczepan could be more explicit as to where in the video he sees this cutting motion.

Ueshiba's use of atemi is either subtle to the point of being invisible or it just isn't there. I don't count the big arm sweeps to the face as atemi since they are plainly not meant to connect as blows.

This video clearly shows that by 1935 Ueshiba had begun to evolve away from his DR background. There is a lot of blending with uke's motion, leading the attacks and throwing via "fitting" as opposed to forcing uke to move in a particular direction.

This video clearly shows that by 1935 Ueshiba had begun to evolve away from his DR background. There is a lot of blending with uke's motion, leading the attacks and throwing via "fitting" as opposed to forcing uke to move in a particular direction.

Ron

Hmm, what make you think that those things don't exist in Daito-ryu?

And what is the "away" part?

And what makes you think there's any more "forcing" going on in Daito-ryu than there is in Aikido?

There have been a couple of threads on Aikiweb about the differences between Daito-ryu and modern Aikido, and none of them have really thrown up much in the way of significant differences in the technical realms.

What Ueshiba was doing in 1935 was close enough to what Takeda was doing that Takeda moved on seamlessly when he took over the Asahi Shimbun dojo in that same year.

Ueshiba was issuing Daito-ryu scrolls up until the late 1930's, well past the Asahi Shimbun demonstration.

This is the same period in which the book "Budo" was created, and we know from Morihiro Saito's testimony that what Ueshiba was doing in Iwama in the 1960's most closely resembled the 1938 technical manual.

We know from this study that there's virtually a one-to-one correlation between basic Aikido technique and the Hiden Mokuroku of Daito-ryu.

And finally, Morihei Ueshiba himself thought that Daito-ryu (in the person of Yoshiyuki Sagawa) was close enough to what he was doing that Sagawa was invited to teach at the Aikikai Hombu dojo in the mid-1950's.

After watching a bunch of DR vids on Youtube it looks to me that those things are incidental to particular techniques whereas Ueshiba seems to have placed greater emphasis on them in his overall approach.

Quote:

Christopher Li wrote:

And what is the "away" part?

"Away" as in a departure from the rigid formalism present in DR form and presentation. "Away" as in the elimination of the coup de gras blow that punctuates the end of most DR techniques.

Quote:

Christopher Li wrote:

And what makes you think there's any more "forcing" going on in Daito-ryu than there is in Aikido?

Just the way it looks, especially against shomen and yokomen attacks. Ueshiba displays very little of the abrupt stoppage of uke's motion in his technique that is apparent in a lot of the DR stuff I've watched. Ueshiba grants his ukes far more freedom of motion.

Also, on the third point, I was actually surprised after watching the film again at how few atemi he is using. In the book, I know that I missed several of the atemi after watching my video and looking at the book.It's funny in the video he doesn't do all that much atemi.

had seminars with Mary Heiny sensei and she mentioned that if your technique didn't include at least 3 atemi, then you aren't do it right. don't know how closely the practice at Shingu to M Ueshiba. also, nage initiates the technique with atemi where uke responds to the atemi which allows nage to perform the technique. i watched the old film and it looked like M Ueshiba did initiate with atemi, just slightly ahead of uke.

After watching a bunch of DR vids on Youtube it looks to me that those things are incidental to particular techniques whereas Ueshiba seems to have placed greater emphasis on them in his overall approach.

I think that it's very chancey to conclude that from watching a bunch of videos on the internet.

Quote:

Ron Ragusa wrote:

"Away" as in a departure from the rigid formalism present in DR form and presentation. "Away" as in the elimination of the coup de gras blow that punctuates the end of most DR techniques.

Some DR schools emphasize the finishing blow, some not at much. FWIW - Ueshiba taught the finishing blow after the war as well, I've seen it in a number of the post-war students. In any case, it's hardly a critical basic element of the base technical method.

Like anything else, DR schools vary in formality. My experience was that Iwama is very similar to the main line of DR in terms of "formality" in general practice.

Quote:

Ron Ragusa wrote:

Just the way it looks, especially against shomen and yokomen attacks. Ueshiba displays very little of the abrupt stoppage of uke's motion in his technique that is apparent in a lot of the DR stuff I've watched. Ueshiba grants his ukes far more freedom of motion.

Of course, Saito used to state repeatedly that Ueshiba changed things for the camera. That aside, I think that this would be a difficult call to make based on some YouTube clips without some actual experience of Daito-ryu.

It is not like Ron just fell off the turnip truck...he is commenting on the videos after training for 37 years.

About something that he's never done, do I have that right?

There was also a list of relevant points that I brought up (apart from the video stuff, but which could have lent more substance to the conversation), all of which were ignored in favor of - "that's what it looked like on YouTube"...

Not even bringing up the point that Saito always insisted that Morihei Ueshiba altered what he did when he was on camera.

We practice techniques called Shoden 118 kajo (also known as Hiden Mokuroku Daito-ryu Aikibudo soke Takeda Tokimune) as basics like mostly Takumakai groups. Also we practice Daito-ryu aikijujutsu techniques from Hisa Takuma's Soden (formal name Daito-ryu Aiki Budo Densho Zen Juikkan). These are 11th books with more than 1500 photos that Takuma Hisa sensei made while had practiced under Ueshiba sensei and Takeda sensei from 1933 to 1939 years. From 1st to 5th books called "Aikido", 6th called "Asahi-ryu jujutsu" (by name of Asahi Shimbun newspaper, but different kanji), that includes high level Ueshiba sensei's wazas. From 7th to 9th called "Daito-ryu aikijujutsu" and consists of Takeda sensei's wazas. There are also two books called Hogi Hiden (grappling secrets or police arrest techniques) and Yoshi Budo (women self defense techniques).

We noticed interest to Ueshiba sensei's prewar techniques described in training manual called "Budo Renshuu". As I know from Takao Kunigoshi interview wazas from "Budo Renshuu" are Morihei Ueshiba's Daito-ryu aikijujutsu. So we had done small demonstration of those wazas using our understanding of Soden ideas from first five books. Those are ikkajo, nikajo, sankajo, yonkajo and irimi. It's not a wazas actually but ideas that uses in a lot of different kind of wazas.

Reading description and analyzing "Budo Renshuu" we saw few interesting things. First of all is that "Budo Renshuu" mostly includes ikkajo wazas but there are some nikajo wazas also. All of them with some changes we can find in the first five books of Hisa Takuma's Soden. Moreover "Budo Renshuu" includes some simple variation of high level Ueshiba sensei's wazas and a lot of aikinage variations. So the most interesting is that some "Budo Renshuu" wazas with changes we can saw in Hiden Mokuroku Daito-ryu Aikibudo soke Takeda Tokimune's ikkajo and nikajo sets.

We took thirty of them to demonstrate: ten idori (suwari) wazas, five hazahandachi (hanmihandachi) wazas, ten tachiai (tachi) wazas and five ushirodori wazas. Here is a video.